9/11

A photo of a memorial reunion at O’Hara’s Restaurant & Pub in Lower Manhattan. Photo by Farnoush Amiri

It was a dissonantly quiet Monday morning in Lower Manhattan. Bartenders at O’Hara’s Restaurant & Pub silently cut limes and lemons and placed them in plastic containers to later garnish the drinks of the almost 6,000 patrons that were expected to walk into the pub that day. The Battery Park watering hole normally opens at 11 a.m. on weekdays, but on this day, for the past 16 years, they unlocked their doors at 8 a.m. in honor of the attacks on the Twin Towers.

Tri-State area natives and tourists alike began to slowly stumble into the bar, located on the corner of Greenwich and Cedar streets, and as they sipped on their cold Bud Lights and Heinekens, each person participated in a moment of silence at 8:46 a.m. to commemorate the tragic moment the first plane hit the north tower.

Two of the first patrons in are Paul Fischer and his son, Frank, who have been coming to O’Hara’s from Union Beach, New Jersey, for the past 16 years. The father and son were some of the first volunteers who came over on the ferry from the Garden State to help join the rescue efforts in the piles and rubble throughout the days following the attacks.

“It’s going to be crazy in here in a little bit,” Fischer said, preparing himself for the bittersweet day ahead. “You won’t be able to get to the bathroom.”

For Fischer, a member of New Jersey’s Sheriff’s office, O’Hara’s represents a tradition for him and his son: a place where he knows almost everyone who walks in and where almost every one of his drinks is on someone else’s tab.

Among the roughly 2,750 people who died that Tuesday morning, many were regulars of O’Hara’s, whether it was for an after-work drink with a colleague or on their lunch break for a burger and fries.

“This place used to a happy-hour destination for those who worked in the area,” said Eric Tremaine, a bartender at O’Hara’s. “But everything changed after that day. This place represents so much more.”

O’Hara’s the morning of the 16th anniversary of 9/11, before the crowds came in. Photo by Farnoush Amiri

The eatery and bar, which first opened its doors in 1983, was also a victim of the attacks, with most of its first and second floors being demolished and left uninhabitable. Fortunately, there were no casualties for any of the staff, who hid down in the basement when the first plane hit. The infamous Irish bar restored and opened its door back to the shaken and grieving community seven months later.

On the first anniversary of the attacks, a New York Firefighter’s badge was ripped off of his shirt and stapled onto the wooden walls of O’Hara’s – by the end of that night there were around 250 embroidered patches and badges covering the walls. Today, the bar proudly displays over 6,000 insignias, which have been gifted from law enforcement officers and firefighters from across the country.

For any newcomers, the traditional Irish bar has two scrapbooks underneath the beer taps that highlight the days, weeks and years since the attack. The lamented pages show the initial damage, the months of repair and rebuilding and the ensuing commemorative events that have followed. Amongst the photographs and news articles detailing the tragic events are letters from patrons, who left the establishment with a sense of understanding of the significance of that day for O’Hara’s and the community that surrounds it.

One family, who traveled from Oak View, Calif. wrote to the owners and said, “Thank you so much for your place and what you stand for.”

The four coordinated attacks that occurred on this day almost a decade and a half ago seem to still ring through the lives of those directly affected and the country as a whole, but for O’Hara’s, it represents a day where anyone who lost something or someone can come, have a pint of Guinness and reminisce on how far they’ve come.

“If you went to my funeral, I would want it to be like this,” Tremaine said as he looked around at the people gathered to remember the lives lost. “I would want you to enjoy and celebrate my life and that is kind of what today is for this place.”

George Gagnon (right) and Joseph Rodriguez joke with each other as they pose near the Freedom Tower today. Both men volunteered at Ground Zero after the attacks. Photo by Amy Zahn

Just before 9 a.m. on the 16th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, George Gagnon and Joseph A. Rodriguez stood close on the corner of West Broadway and Vesey Street, heads together, talking like old friends.

Rodriguez adjusted his black Desert Storm Veteran cap. This morning was his first time visiting the site of the attacks on the anniversary. It was Gagnon’s 16th. He had gone every year without fail, through emphysema, a triple bypass, 18 artery stints and most recently, a heart surgery just two weeks before this year’s visit to Ground Zero.

But the pair weren’t old friends. They had met just minutes before.

“It was the day, the moment,” Rodriguez said about what brought them together. The two found common ground instantly. Both are war veterans — Rodriguez from the Persian Gulf, and Gagnon from Vietnam — and both showed up 16 years ago in the wake of the attacks’ devastation to help in any way they could.

Gagnon was an iron worker at the time, though he’s retired now. He recounted a story he had just told Rodriguez about cutting through steel to help pull people, living and deceased, from the rubble. One body, he said, was pinned down by a beam, her wedding band still on her finger.

“We spent three hours just getting that steel off so not to disturb the body,” Gannon said. “It was just doing what you had to do.”

Rodriguez nodded. The two stood close. An onlooker would not have known that, even an hour before, neither had known the other existed.

Rodriguez remembers the day vividly. He had planned on attending a job interview in one of the towers that day, realizing only while he was getting dressed, after seeing what his father was watching on TV, that he’d be heading downtown for a different reason.

“I’m watching the TV, saying, ‘Dad, what movie are you watching?’ He goes, ‘Son, that’s not a movie. Look at the TV clearly. At the left corner it says, ‘live.’’”

Rodriguez lent his help for days, stopping only after he rushed to the Veterans’ Affairs hospital and discovered he had double pneumonia. He never followed up on his job lead, deciding it wasn’t meant to be. It was for a government job, he said.

“The CIA!” Gagnon joked.

Rodriguez would discover another personal connection to the attacks, months later. He was having breakfast at a diner near his home in the Bronx when he opened a newspaper and saw a memorial for a good friend from high school — Officer Jerome Dominguez, one of the 60 police officers who lost their lives that day.

“I just broke down like a baby,” he said. “That’s the reason why I’m here today, to honor him.”

Gagnon identified with Rodriguez’s feeling of loss, having lost friends in Vietnam, and with Rodriguez’s reasons for visiting the site of the attacks.

“I think it’s our duty as Americans to come down here,” he said. There are only two places Gagnon makes it a point to go to every year: Washington D.C. over Memorial Day weekend, and Ground Zero on September 11.

The somber mood broke when Gagnon pulled out a black flip phone. Rodriguez, over a decade younger but a head taller, began dictating his phone number.

“We gotta go drinking one day,” Rodriguez said. Gagnon agreed. But first, Rodriguez wants to reflect — to honor the dead, the living, and the life he’s spent the last decade and a half making for himself.

“I guess that’s the sweetest revenge you can give to anybody who brings terror to us, is to live your American dream, live your American rights and just live.”

Kenneth Lane, 55, “a truth seeker” held up his board for everyone at Ground Zero to see. Photo by Polina Meshkova

In the midst of crowds gathered at Ground Zero to pay their respects to the victims of 9/11, the news outlets trying to get a good coverage, and tourists wandering around with cameras, Kenneth Lane, an African American Trump supporter, stood in a “9/11 Was An Inside Job” T-shirt.

Lane, 55, from Amityville, New York, who called himself “a truth seeker and an America first type of person,” is sure that 9/11 was nothing more than a false attack to evoke fear in the general population. Lane is not the type of person to keep quiet. He has about 3,000 followers on his Twitter account and shares his opinions with anyone willing to listen.

And there are quite a few at today’s 9/11 anniversary. Lane stood next to two other Trump supporters who held American flags and wore patriotic badges all over their jackets, which definitely attracted attention.

When the attacks took place, Lane said, he was a waiter at Red Lobster in Long Island, New York.

“I always remember this day,” he said. “Everyone was looking up at the TV, and then, when I saw a plane actually go into the World Trade Center, that’s when it struck. I said, “Wait, this is something big happening!”

Lane said that seeing the buildings implode led him to think that those buildings were brought down on purpose.

“The point I am trying to make is that 9/11 was an inside job,” he said. “It was an inside job done by the powerful elite both in the United States and in other countries.”

In Lane’s opinion, the entire event was orchestrated in order to use fear as a mechanism to pressure people into allowing the government to take more control over their lives. He believes that all the wars that followed were preplanned long before 9/11 took place.

“They want to keep us in these wars because we always need a boogeyman and it’s all about control,” he said.

Although Peter Santoro of the Upper East Side of Manhattan listened to Lane, he didn’t agree.

“At first blush, I was angry at him for having such a loud voice in this somber moment,” Santoro said. “But the truth is, this is what freedom is all about. There are countries where, if a person like this was adamantly opposed to the general opinion and what the government and people feel, he would be shunned away and jailed immediately. Yet in this country, we’re able to have someone like that come to a somber ceremony like this, perhaps in some ways maybe even be a bit disruptive, but still have his voice heard.”

Santoro said that 9/11 is personal to every American, whether affected by the tragedy directly or not, especially to those who were in the city during those devastating events.

“If you lived in the city and remember the smell of death, you can never forget that,” he said. “There could be nothing more personal than that.”

Located in the cemetery behind St. Paul’s Chapel of Trinity Church, the Bell of Hope is rung annually in honor of the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Photo by Claire Tighe

Amid the din of construction, sirens, and car honks, the bells of Trinity Church in Lower Manhattan tolled majestically this morning in honor of the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Few passersby seem to notice except for a small group of visitors gathered in the cemetery of St. Paul’s Chapel in the church for the annual ringing of the Bell of Hope.

In the weeks and months after 9/11, Trinity served as a safe haven for rescue workers, volunteers and mourning community members. The church, which sits directly across from ground zero, suffered little damage during the attacks.

“One hundred yards away, when the towers came down and the mushroom cloud destroyed the surrounding area, the oldest freestanding building on Manhattan — St. Paul’s — and its steeple was still there,” said David Sommerville, 74, an Episcopalian minister from Brunswick, Georgia. He volunteered at the church after the attacks.

Sixteen years later, the crowds have thinned, but the church continues its tradition of holding space in remembrance of that day and months following.

“I’m here for the memories of grieving that were ministered to me on that morning,” said Sommerville. “In the Episcopal church, we have a theology that says, ‘We know who we are because we remember. We know ourselves by our memories.’ I’m here helping keep memories alive. It’s like that famous quote, ‘If we don’t remember the evil things that were done, we will repeat them.'”

Reverend Doctor William Lupfer, the church rector, rang the bell in four strikes of five, the tradition of a New York firehouse bell code used to mark the death of a firefighter. After the ceremony, church employees, ministers, and security outnumbered their visitors. Two firefighters and one accompanying family member paused for a moment of silence inside the chapel. One guest lit a candle before taking a seat to pray. A few tourists paused in front of the permanent 9/11 memorial, spending a mere few moments with the memorabilia. Teddy bears, badges of fallen fighters and police officers, and a church volunteer’s notebook were among the items selected to represent the snapshot in time.

Fabien Taclet, 32, a tourist from France, said that although the crowds were thin, the attacks changed the world.

“I lived in London at the time and remember that the attacks marked a new era in which no one was safe anymore,” he said.

Outside the gates of St. Paul’s Cemetery, Gage Pullmeyer, 17, from Lincoln, Nebraska, paused aside a throng of people emerging from the subway. He used his phone to take photo of the new One World Trade Center building.

“I was only one at the time, but it was America’s greatest tragedy,” Pullmeyer said. “I wish I was older so I could remember. I think remembering makes us stronger. We are all so separated nowadays and there is so much hate going around. 9/11 was about hate, so this is bringing us together as a country. It’s important to reflect.”

At 9:50 a.m., a city fire department flag procession walked the perimeter of St. Paul’s heading toward the memorial site. Commuters momentarily made way for the procession’s large flags and accompanying family members in plainclothes. The usual lower Manhattan crowds resumed their Monday routines as the procession faded into the background of another workday.

Fifteen years after the 9/11 attacks, which was led by Islamic terrorists, the city’s Muslim community continues to deal with discrimination and hatred.

“I’ve been “jokingly” called a terrorist,” Tahseen Rabbi, a video producer from Briarwood, Queens said.

With nearly one million Muslims, New York is reportedly among the states with the highest Muslim population. Despite the city’s high Muslim population, Rabbi, a lively and bubbly Bangladeshi woman who describes herself as a “very liberal Muslim”, and many others have failed to escape the shadow of the 9/11 attacks.

“Ever since 9/11, there has been a stigma attached to the religion,” Shadman Ahmed, 21, a senior at Saint John’s University in Fresh Meadows, Queens said. “Muslims are now automatically associated with a lot of negativity.”

The presidential election has only bought more scorn towards the community. Republican candidate Donald Trump has been openly critical of Muslim immigration.

Rafat Ashraf Khalaf, a junior at New York University, whose family immigrated to the United States through Ellis Island in 1912, recently faced discrimination by a cyber-bully online.

“When you analyze this election and the rhetoric that is thrown around, the situation continues to exacerbate,” Khalaf said. “I have personally received a bunch of hateful messages, mostly through the Internet. A guy … messaged me on Facebook and said, “F. OFF and go back to your country. Leave.”

In the days following the attacks, many leaders encouraged Americans not to blame the Muslim community for attacks. But lately the media is filled with threats of deportation. The recurrent attacks in France, the shootings in California and Florida and the rise of the terrorist organization ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Syria) have again made local Muslim targets of American anger.

“A lot of people really don’t know anything about Islam, only what they see on the news,” Khalaf said. “So when the only thing they hear about is a bombing by someone who claims to be Muslim, that is going to only negatively impact their perception of Muslims as a whole.”

These negative labels have confusioned some Muslims like, Afraz Khan, 21, a student at New York University.

“I am at a point now that if I see someone who has a large beard, rather than seeing that as a mark of their faith or seeing it as someone I can trust or someone who is part of my community, I am more in a doubt that proud,” Khan said.

The negative press has led Afraz Khan,21 an NYU student to be fearful of his community. Photo by Lisa Seyton

Despite the negativity surrounding his religion, Khan believes better days are ahead.

“I think people are becoming more willing to learn about and understand one another,” Khan said.

Sakim Alam, a Bangladeshi pharmacist at Cohen Children’s Medical Center in New Hyde Park, Queens, was in fourth grade when the 9/11 attacks occurred. While he feared the repercussion of the attacks on Muslims, today Alam sees it as a good opportunity to educate people.

“Instead of feeling offended, we, Muslims should educate the public on the proper/peaceful teachings of Islam through words and examples,” said Alam. “Yes, there is racism and prejudice everywhere, but all of that will change when we show the world that we are the same as everyone else.”

The name of firefighter, Peter Bielfeld who was killed during the 9/11 attacks. His whose family was at the memorial. Photo by Jennifer Cohen

On the morning of the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks the mourners and tourists made their way to ground zero to remember the nearly 3,000 lives lost.

Many wore shirts to commemorate their loved ones that were killed. Dominic Branda and his family, of Ringwood, New Jersey, wore matching navy blue shirts with the FDNY seal on the front right pocket. On the back of the shirts was a red fire truck and the name Peter Bielfeld, and FDNY Ladder 42 in white.

“My wife’s brother was killed as a fireman in the South Tower,” Branda said referring to the name on his shirt.

Peter Bielfeld, 44, was part of Ladder 42 in the Bronx. At the time the first tower was hit, Bielfeld was at a follow-up doctor’s visit taking care of injuries he sustained in a fire. But no injury was going to hold him back from going to the World Trade Center to help.

“He was in Metro Tech Brooklyn, he was injured and he jumped in a captain’s car and came over the Brooklyn Bridge. Fate put him in Brooklyn at that time,” Branda said of his brother in-law.

And that was the last time anyone saw him.

John Hudnall, from Austin, Texas, came to visit the memorial with a friend. They can remember exactly where and what they were doing 15 years ago. They wanted to visit the memorial to pay tribute to the victims. Although our country has made strides against terrorism, Hudnall still believes another attack is imminent.

“I travel weekly for work, and I fly, and it terrifies my wife everyday, every time I’m on a plane or waiting to get on a plane”, said Hudnall.

He said he has the same fears as his wife.

David Sears, from upstate New York, was standing near the corner of Broadway and Vesey waving a small American flag. He wore an American flag on his t-shirt and a bright red hat with the letters USA written across the front. He watched as the friends and family of the victims of 9/11 entered the memorial at 8:30am. He came to the memorial first thing in the morning because as a patriotic man and a New Yorker, he felt it was his duty.

He remembered he prayed on 9/11.

David Sears standing outside the 9/11 memorial waving his American flag. Photo by Jennifer Cohen

“I got with my family and prayed that we would get through the day ok and all of our fellow Americans would get through the day ok.”

Sears believes today is completely different from what it was like in 2001.
Anybody who has the slightest thought of being a terrorist is thrown in jail,” he said. “Back then everything was just so free and open.”

Sears worries about the possibility of an attack happening again.

“Unfortunately, history dictates that we do get complacent after a while you know but, hopefully in my lifetime we will never see anything like this again,” said Sears.

Michael Arnold, of Atlanta, Georgia, believes the World Trade Center was blown up by demolition. He handed out fliers near ground zero today, the 15th anniversary of 9/11. Photo by Eli Kurland

Today is the 15th anniversary of 9/11 and at the northern edge of the World Trade Center complex, colorful signs elicit ugly stares or thoughtful solidarity – depending on who you ask.

This is where you’ll find ‘9/11 Truthers,’ people who dispute the mainstream account of what happened on September 11, 2001. Their main allegation is that the Twin Towers and Tower 7 collapsed from a controlled demolition, and the plane crashes were just a diversion. Truthers come to this spot every Saturday with signs, t-shirts, pamphlets and of course, talking points. Today, on the 15th anniversary of the attacks, they are especially vocal.

“I was devastated when I learned the truth,” said Michael Arnold,50, who works as a counselor for special needs students in Atlanta, Georgia. He traveled to New York City to spread his message at the World Trade Center . “I was non-functional and almost got divorced. Then I spent way too much money on billboards and fliers. My goal is ju–“

He abruptly stopped talking, cocked his head towards a passing group of men in formal military attire and shouted, “Building 7 came down in less than 7 seconds! Controlled demolition!” Then he picked right up where he left off. “Sorry, I had to tell them. Anyways, my goal is justice – spreading the message as far and wide as possible.”

Arnold discovered the 9/11 Truther movement because his wife told him to get a hobby, so he started routinely reading political filmmaker Michael Moore’s blog about social issues. People would discuss the Truther movement in the comments section of articles. It sucked Arnold in and he became one of the regular commenters, posting Truther literature and combing over what was provided by others.

He’s the salesman of the group. but when he talks about why he’s here Marty speaks from the heart.

“We don’t do this because we’re nuts,” he said. “We do this because we love humanity. We love the world. We just don’t like being lied to. I know we’re ridiculed, but we’ve got architects in our movement, we’ve got college professors, independent journalists, military guys, ground zero guys who were here and felt the explosion, and saw the buildings go down. We’re a microcosm of society. We dug a little deeper than most. “We’re speaking up!”

Claudio Marty displays a copy of the hundreds of pamphlets he gave out today. Photo by Eli Kurland

Marty said he watched the towers fall from his rooftop in Park Slope. His neighbors were on their rooftops too – steel workers, construction workers, cops, the inhabitants of a blue-collar neighborhood. Marty alleged the first thing these people said after collectively watching the towers crumble was that this was a controlled demolition.

“We know construction and we’re not stupid guys,” he said. “We watch the Science Channel and we’re mechanically inclined. We have common sense. We all said the same thing, but the television told us something else.”

Ten years later, Marty was watching a business television program and for the third time that month, people called in to ask the host’s opinion about the mainstream account of what happened on 9/11. Marty said architects and engineers were calling in to inquire too. The program had nothing to do with 9/11 or politics. Marty’s interest was piqued and there was no turning back.

Marty now runs his own advertising company, but has shrunk his client roster down to a quarter of its previous size so he can devote more energy to the Truther movement. Like Arnold, the movement is Marty’s lifestyle and he said he’ll never stop.

Javier Castro Suarez, 41, of Kearny, New Jersey, stands in front of the National September 11 Memorial & Museum entrance with two small American flags in his hands. Suarez visits ground zero every year. Photo by Cassidy Morrison.

Each year, thousands of people journey to New York City to pay their respects to the 3,000 victims of the 9/11 terror attacks.

Fifteen years later it is still painful.

“It was heartbreaking 15 years ago,” said Dennis D. Jenkin, Jr., 47, of Ohio. “Me and my wife were here on vacation. We heard a plane about two blocks away flying low… next thing I knew the tower got hit. I wanted to help, but my wife had to come first and I got her to safety.”

Jenkin visits the memorial every year to commemorate those lives lost.

“I try to come back every year,” he said. “It’s hard because of work. But 15 years later I’m here and it seems like it was just last year that it happened. It’s very emotional.”

Jenkin is not alone in his dedication to visiting the World Trade Center. Hundreds of thousands of people from 50 states and over 100 countries have visited the National September 11 Memorial & Museum since it opened five years ago.

Jay Couch, 52, of the Philippines said he it changed the way people feel about the world.

“I got home after work and turned on the news. It was horrible,” he said. “After, there was a bad atmosphere. It lasted for weeks. It has defined how we live in a large part. It affects how you feel about other parts of the world.”

People from other parts of the US and the world gathered in front of the museum entrance early on the morning of the 15th anniversary. Tourists and locals alike carried cameras and American flags around the fountain that sits beside the museum site.

Javier Castro Suarez, 41, of Kearny, New Jersey, stood in front of the museum entrance with two small American flags in his hands. He recounted the day on which he was meant to go to work in the first tower as supervisor of the cleaning company.

“I come here every year now for 15 years,” Suarez said. “I was doing laundry on the day, getting ready. Someone tells me, ‘turn on the TV’ and I see the second plane. Outside my window I could see the Towers. I was supposed to be working there, but my alarm did not wake me.”

Suarez writes poetry and prayers for the victims of the 9/11 attacks. It is easy, he says, to only see the disaster and the destruction inherent in this event. But that is not the healing way. He also sees possibility of rebirth.

“This tragedy woke up the country,” he said. “It forced us to see one another as people, as brothers, not just as different cities or different states.”

Every year Suarez takes a photograph of the site, waves hello to familiar former employees and composes a prayer for those who perished 15 years ago.

As tourists waited outside the museum until it opened to the general public, police officers milled about the square keeping an eye on the surroundings. The atmosphere was somber as New Yorkers and out-of-towners snapped photos of the new skyscraper recently erected nearby.

Spectators with guidebooks, English dictionaries and cameras in hand stood sentinel as early morning church bells tolled in remembrance of those lost. Regardless of nationality or native tongue, each visitor had a story of the morning on which the world changed.

“We are all neighbors,” Suarez said in his native Spanish, “and therefore we are family.”

Warren Wilhide stood Sunday morning with scores of other people in the courtyard of St. Paul’s Chapel to honor those who passed away in the terrorist attacks on 9/11. Photo by Razi Syed

‘I think it’s a very important time to come over here,” said the 85-year-old Wilhide, a resident of Morristown, New Jersey. Wilhide was among roughly 100 people present on the anniversary of 9/11 for the Ringing the Bell ceremony at the chapel, which stands adjacent to the site of the World Trade Center and became a source of refuge and place for reflection for many first-responders in the months following the attack.

The chapel, which was spared as the Twin Towers collapsed, became known as “The Little Chapel that Stood.”

On the first anniversary of 9/11, the Mayor of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury presented the Bell of Hope to St. Paul’s Chapel, which has been operating in Manhattan since colonial times.

“This is a holy, sacred day for people all around the world,” the Rev. William Lupfer said, welcoming visitors to the chapel’s courtyard.

The bell, roughly two-feet tall and hoisted above a base made of brownstone, was cast in London’s Whitechapel Bell Foundry, where Philadelphia’s Liberty Bell was made.

The Bell of Hope, which stands in the courtyard of St. Paul’s Chapel, is rung on the anniversary of 9/11 each year to honor victims of the attack. The bell was given to the chapel by the Mayor of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury in September2002. By Razi Syed.

“It reminds us that freedom is an important part of who we are as Americans, and who we are as citizens of this world,” he said. “We also ring the bell for victims of other political violence. It’s a sacred duty that we have.”

The bell, which is rung on the anniversary of 9/11 each year, was also rung after terrorist attacks in London, Madrid and Mumbai, as well as after mass shootings in Aurora, Colorado and at Virginia Tech.

Wilhide said he woke up Sunday at 4 a.m. so he could make the journey from New Jersey to Lower Manhattan.

“That used to be my office right over there, on the 14th floor when it was AT&T,” Wilhide said, pointing to 195 Broadway, a 29-story building sitting directly across from the chapel. “I used to look out that window every day on St. Paul’s [Chapel].”

While working in the old AT&T building during the late ‘60s and ‘70s, Wilhide was able to see the World Trade Center as it was built.

“So when I would go home to New Jersey, I’d go through the towers to get the subway to go home,” he said.

Thomas Pearce, 22, visited the chapel to pay his respects to those who died in the attacks. .Pearce, who has lived in Flatbush, Brooklyn for the past four months, recalled his experience on 9/11 as a 7-year-old in the United Kingdom.

“I was taken out of school,” Pearce said. “In England, everyone got taken out of school, everyone got sent home. We didn’t really get taught about it, we just got told it was a bad thing.”

Elena Shnayer, 25, said she came to St. Paul’s Chapel early Sunday morning to show her remembrance and appreciation for those who have passed away.

Growing up in New York City, Schnayer vividly remembers the day the towers fell.

“I was 11 – it was my fourth day of fifth grade,” said Schnayer, who lives in Flatbush. “I went to school in Lower Manhattan. Our parents picked us up and I went outside, and I could see everything.

“I was able to see smoke, I was able to see people jumping and falling – everything,” she said.

Schnayer said this year was the first time, with Pearce, her friend and roommate, by her side, that she was able to bring herself to attend the Ringing of the Bell ceremony.

At 8:46 a.m., the moment American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the North Tower, Lupfer rang the bell in four sets of five rings, following the tradition of the New York City firefighters salute to fallen comrades.

“Part of the Christian work is to remember, to bring back together, and to be a force that brings people together against those forces that try to bring us apart,” Lupfer said to the scores assembled around the bell. “I invite you now to close your eyes, to open your hearts, take a few deep breaths.”

Edward Olaié stood wrapped in an American flag outside of the World Trade Center Site. Photo by Brelaun Douglas

In Lower Manhattan, at 8:46 a.m. this morning, the St. Paul’s Church Bell of Hope tolled in honor of the victims of the 9/11 attacks. Standing across the street just outside of the World Trade Center Site, wrapped in and American flag, was Edward Olaié.

For many Americans, 9/11 is a day in history to be forever remembered. On the early morning of September 11, 2001, four passenger airplanes were hijacked: one was crashed into the Pentagon in Washington D.C., one into Pennsylvania and the other two into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York. Around 3,000 people were killed, over 6,000 injured and in the following years major changes were made to airport policies and American defense.

But only three-years-old during the attacks, Olaié, 19, has no actual memory of the tragic day in American history.

The Kew Gardens, Queens resident is among a group of Americans with no direct memory of this day or a pre 9/11 America. There is nothing for them to compare it to or memories of that day for them to share. With the average age of a high school freshman being between 13- 15, no one in the ninth grade and below would have been born for the events of 9/11. Those a few years older would have little to no memory of the day.
Yet the day still resonates with them, despite not being able to remember or having been born for it, as a day for paying their respects to those whose lives were lost.

“It hit all of New York and America, so I come down here to pay respect to people who lost their families and to New York,” Olaié, said standing in the cloudy, cool morning air.

Olaié was taught about the event in school and felt inspired by what he learned.

“In all of the grades they taught us about it,” he said. “In 8th grade, my science teacher said that he was down here helping out and ever since then I was like I’ll come down here as much as I can.”

As the clouds began to disappear and the sun shone through, North New Jersey resident Brayden Ortiz, arrived with his father to also pay his respects for the lives lost.

“My dad knew a lot of the people who died there and he worked with them,” said the 12-year-old of his father who works for Port Authority. “So we came down to look at the memorial.”

An American flag and order of flowers hung on a fence outside of the World Trade Center Site. Photo by Brelaun Douglas.

Having not been born yet, Ortiz gets his knowledge of the events from what he is taught in school.

“We learned that planes crashed into the towers and many people saved other people’s lives,” he said standing outside of the World Trade Center Site closed off to the public until 3 p.m. to allow a memorial ceremony for victim’s families. “They basically risked their lives to save the innocent. There were people who didn’t really know anyone and they saved a lot of people’s lives and they died for other people.”

Mason Gray, 14, also uses what he learns at school to form his perception of the day.

“We were taught about the times of all the events that happened, the collapse, the planes and everything,” said the Wilkes Barre, Pa. resident. “How many people died and how we remember it.”

Born two months later in December, Gray sees the events of 9/11 as a testament to America’s strength and resilience.

“It basically means that nothing can bring America down, that tower right there says that,” he said pointing to the Freedom Tower. “We’ll always stand back up.”